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ToeJam
ToeJam & Earl is an action game developed by Johnson Voorsanger Productions and published by Sega for the Sega Genesis console. Released in 1991, it centers on ToeJam and Earl—alien rappers who have crash-landed on Earth. As they attempt to escape the planet, players assume the role of either character and collect pieces of their wrecked spacecraft. ToeJam & Earl's design was heavily influenced by the role-playing video game Rogue, and took from it such features as the random generation of levels and items. It references and parodies the 1980s and early 90s urban culture and is set to a funk soundtrack. The game was positively received by critics, who praised its originality, soundtrack, humor and two-player cooperative mode. It attained sleeper hit status despite low initial sales, and its protagonists were used as mascots by Sega. ToeJam & Earl was followed by two sequels: ToeJam & Earl in Panic on Funkotron and ToeJam & Earl III: Mission to Earth, released for the Sega Genesis and Xbox respectively. The sequels' commercial and critical success was mixed. A fourth title, ToeJam & Earl: Back in the Groove, is currently in development with funds from Kickstarter. The game was re-released for the Wii's Virtual Console in December 2006 and re-released again on PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade in November 2012. Plot ToeJam & Earl has been called a surreal, comic satire, and a "daringly misanthropic commentary on Earthly life". The game's protagonists, ToeJam and Earl, have been described as a "three-legged red alien" and "fat orange alien", respectively.ToeJam wears a large gold medallion and a backward baseball cap, while Earl is marked by high-tops and oversized sunglasses; both outfits are "over-the-top appropriations" of 1990s urban culture. Their speech features California slang. The game is set to a soundtrack which has been described both as jazz-funk, and as hip hop. For the game's unique sound, composer John Baker was inspired by Herbie Hancock and The Headhunters. In the game's opening sequence, ToeJam explains that Earl's erratic piloting abilities have resulted in a crash-landing on Earth. He says that they must find the pieces of their space craft wreckage to return to their home planet, Funkotron. The player guides the characters as they avoid Earth's antagonistic inhabitants and search for the debris. Should the player succeed, the final sequence depicts ToeJam and Earl escaping the planet in their reconstructed spacecraft. Under the player's control, the characters proceed across a purple landscape that represents Funkotron, and are greeted by their friends and family. Gameplay ToeJam & Earl takes place from a 3/4 perspective in a 2D game world. Its gameplay mechanics were inspired by Rogue, which has led to its description as a Roguelike or dungeon-crawl game.89 The game contains both single-player and two-player cooperative modes. The latter displays a single screen when both characters are near each other, but splits it apart when they are not.1 Playing the game with two players reveals dialogue and jokes between the characters not heard in the single-player game.14 The game is set on Earth, which is represented by randomly generated islands that float in space,8 each one a layer above the last. They are connected by elevators. Some islands contain pieces of spacecraft wreckage, of which the player must collect 10 to win the game.1 The player character drops to the island below if he falls from an island's edge, which necessitates that the player again locate an elevator.4 Each island is populated by antagonistic "Earthlings", such as phantom ice-cream trucks, aggressive packs of "nerds", giant hamsters, Bogeymen, man-eating mailboxes, and chickens armed with mortars that shoot tomatoes.1410Certain Earthlings aid the player.1 The game has been described as "largely non-violent",11 as the protagonists can only attack enemies with thrown tomatoes—one of many temporary, randomly generated power-ups.1 Power-ups are contained in wrapped presents,8 which are categorized by appearance. The contents of a present are unknown to the player until it is opened; afterwards, all presents of that appearance are identified. A certain type of NPC will also identify presents for a fee. Presents with question marks can hold any item at random, so their contents cannot be identified on sight alone. Identification of presents' contents is a central gameplay mechanic.89 Each power-up has a unique effect: while one might increase the player characters' running speed, another distracts enemies.48 Certain presents contain harmful power-ups, such as the loss of a "life", or the "Randomizer", which resets the identity of all presents. In the game's cooperative mode, if one player character opens a present in the vicinity of the other, its contents affect both characters.9 As players open more presents, the chances of accidentally opening the Randomizer are increased, which prevents the game from becoming easier as more presents are identified. Category:Games